Looks, They Change Everything
by 1986spacekitten
Summary: Hermione is bullied because of her muggleborn status, her looks, and her smarts. What can having friends do to change that? WBWL Cold!Harry Pretty!Hermione


Hermione Granger was about ready to cry. She tried to make friends, she really did! But then she chose to walk into the boy-who-lived, Ashton Potter's compartment.

She knocked on the compartment door.

"_Come in!" A cheery voice replied Hermione walked into the compartment that held three redheads. After asking if she could sit with them and the boy with green eyes immediately said yes, that's when it started going downhill. The girl asked her name but laughed when told it was Hermione. _

"_Well at least a pretty name wasn't wasted on an ugly girl!" the redhead giggled, "We are going to be the most popular here, Ashton Potter, Ron Weasley, and Susan Bones are the names and being brave is our game." _

_Hermione's eyes teared up and the boy she assumed was Ron laughed. Hermione ran out of the compartment and walked, holding back tears to the other end of the train. Hoping to find some nicer people, she knocked on a compartment that seemed to have first years in it. Once she was invited in the blond boy and his two massive friends proceeded to mock her and call her a 'mudblood'. Whatever that was._

_Hermione gradually fell asleep and hours passed. Hermione awoke as the train jolted to a stop, wiping tears from her face, she stepped off the train. _

After following the largest man she had ever seen, Hermione got into a boat with an angular boy who had the most beautiful green eyes, and a pair of Indian looking twins. The four were silent until they got a quarter of the way across the lake. The boy started speaking,

"I am Harry Potter, heir to the potter legacy," Hermione immediately looked away from him, tears welling back into her eyes, "and hopefully I am nothing like that terror of a brother that they call the "boy-who-lived" Hermione sighed in relief.

"And we,"

"The wonders,"

"The mystical-"

"Magical-"

"Grinning-"

"Twinning"

"Patil Sisters!" they finished together. Hermione decided that whatever it took, she would befriend these three.

* * *

All the first year were grouped in the entrance hall and told by Professor Minerva McGonagall to arrange themselves alphabetically. They all filed in and one by one.

Immediately they noticed a worn hat sitting on a stool.

_Oh, you may not think I'm pretty,_

_But don't judge on what you see,_

_I'll eat myself if you can find_

_A smarter hat than me._

_You can keep your bowlers black,_

_Your top hats sleek and tall,_

_For I'm the Hogwarts Sorting Hat_

_And I can cap them all._

_There's nothing hidden in your head_

_The Sorting Hat can't see,_

_So try me on and I will tell you_

_Where you ought to be._

_You might belong in Gryffindor,_

_Where dwell the brave at heart,_

_Their daring, nerve and chivalry_

_Set Gryffindors apart;_

_You might belong in Hufflepuff,_

_Where they are just and loyal,_

_Those patient Hufflepuffs are true_

_And unafraid of toil;_

_Or yet in wise old Ravenclaw,_

_If you've a ready mind,_

_Where those of wit and learning,_

_Will always find their kind;_

_Or perhaps in Slytherin_

_You'll make your real friends,_

_Those cunning folk use any means_

_To achieve their ends._

_So put me on! Don't be afraid!_

_And don't get in a flap!_

_You're in safe hands (though I have none)_

_For I'm a Thinking Cap!_

Hermione swung her head around trying to find the source of the clapping, only recently noticing the hundreds of other students. She zoned out, looking at all the decorations. Four massive tables full of students and a table up at the front, just behind the stool with what she assumed were the teachers.

The man in the black robes seems the hardest to please, I should make a good impression on him. Teachers are going to be some of my only friends here.

The teacher up front called

"Granger, Hermione" and a few kids laughed before the man in black glared and they silenced. Hermione walked towards the stool with all the grace she could muster and set the hat upon her head.

* * *

Severus Snape had never liked muggle-borns. They tried too hard to bring muggle culture into the wizarding world but they did not approve of _our_ customs.

_But this Hermione Granger girl is different,_ he mused. _She has so much fire, not breaking when the majority of the school laughed at her._

Severus played with his knife, twirling it around. When that infernal hat screamed out

"SLYTHERIN" and practically hopped off her head shaking and begging Minerva to have a break and go back to his '_Sweet cosy shelf with no scary children threatening death'_

Severus began laughing, cackling like a madman, and stabbed his knife into the table. Praying that the girl was strong he continued to think.

The only other notable sorting was the elder Potter twin arrived in Slytherin and when that happened Severus gave him a sneer.


End file.
